


Penultimate To Prestige

by ZuskatoR3D



Category: Original Work
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, F/M, Fantasy, Monsters, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-20
Updated: 2019-02-21
Packaged: 2019-10-13 06:57:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,327
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17483330
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ZuskatoR3D/pseuds/ZuskatoR3D
Summary: Adventurer, these are what Zuskato and Sakuya Zyus are, their lives dedicated to exploring new lands, meeting new people, and most of all. Making a name for themselves.However, fate will test them, destiny will fight them, and time will catch up to them, how far will they go just to make their dreams a reality?





	1. Chapter 1

_Somewhere in a grass planes._

In some random grass plane, the sky's were blue, the sun was shining, the wind was blowing, trees were standing firm and strong, leaves getting blown away, everything was normal and nothing seemed out of place.

Other than a muscular green skin-like man getting skewered with a spear and dying to said injury, the spear pulled out of the now dead monster and it's user swung it diagonally to rid it of the blood from the Orc.

Satisfied that the blood came off of the spear's blade, the user spun their polearm and rested it upon their shoulders, the camera slowly moved upwards which scaled our spear user's appearance. The pants they wore were red and black in colour near the hips area had armour colored a dark shade of gold. Going up the the person wore a jacket with the same color as the pants just slightly more lighter in shade and a white shirt underneath it along with a red tie, the same armour were on both sides of the arms.

The figure's hair was stlyed back with a small string of hair acting as an ahoge, their face was hidden by a white mask with gold outlines, if the metal piece wasn't there the full view of young face and their red and black eyes would be exposed for all to see. Unfortunately it wasn't.

This, is an adventurer named Zuskato Zyus, He accepted a quest to hunt down rouge Orcs in the grass plains that were causing trouble for the locals. He, along with his sister, were just about to finish their quest.

However, unknown to the red adventurer, or he already had, a looming shadow was raising behind him.

"Urrrrggggghhhh!" An Orc yelled as it appeared behind Zuskato and raised it's axe hoping to cut the human adventurer in-half. Said male turned around not even making an effort to defend himself as he titled his head slightly to the left letting the tip of a staff pass him and fire off a lighting bolt to the Orc's face making it explode and killing the monster before it's body fell backwards on the ground.

The red adventurer turned his head and saw a younger female girl with her hand on her hips clearly disappointed with the current situation she and Zuskato were in, she wore a white and red Shrine Kimono, with a green cloak hugging her neck. She held a staff on her right hand which was a neatly made wooden staff, she had a sword sheathed on her back as a backup in case she needed to fight in close quarters.

Her pink hair styled in a long ponytail reaching her midsection was flowing through the air, her face morphed into a frown, her dual cyan and gold colored eyes held irritation at the person infront of her, this is Sakuya Zyus, the younger sister of Zuskato, an apprentice sorceress.

"That was highly reckless, Onii-chan." The younger sibling stated, Zuskato, in response laughed it off saying it was all fine and dandy.

"Hey, I knew an Orc was right behind me, but I figured you'd deal with it, so I didn't bother." He replied.

"Even so, what if I didn't? What if that Orc killed you?!" She snapped.

"Sorry! Sorry! I know what you mean, jeez, I'll be more careful next time okay?" Zuskato reassured his sister. The sister let out an annoyed huff as she whacked her brother's head with her staff causing him to wince while he held the place where he was hit in pain.

"Ow! Really! Did you really have to do that!" He whined still holding his head down to smoother the pain. The pinkette smirked as she placed a hand on her mouth to let out a giggle while watching her brother with glee.

"Of course I do, otherwise I wouldn't know if you were saying the truth or not." She stated, Zuskato after a few seconds, recovered from the blow to the head and glared at his sister who returned it with a mischievous look along with a smirk. Despite having a mask to hide his face, Zuskato hung his head down and accepted defeat giving the younger sibling the victory.

"Fine. Ok. I promise I'll try to stop being so reckless." The older sibling said, Sakuya smiled and walked up to her brother, "Now, as punishment for being reckless, you'll do the honours of cutting the heads of our now dead Orcs." Zuskato sighed in defeat and nodded. "Alright, Sakuya, I'll get on it."

Sakuya handed her brother an empty sack, Zuskato sighed once more and grabbed the sack knowing exactly what to do with it. He went up to each Orc corpses and begun to cut their heads off, it was needed after all how else were they gonna get evidence for completing their quest, he also looted the dead monsters for any gold they had on them, it's not like their gonna using anyways.

Zuskato walked up to the last corpse and dropped the sack, he raised his spear up then plunged it into the neck cutting it clean with one swing, Zuskato instinctively covered his eyes to shield them from the spilling blood that violently came out.

At that moment, Zuskato remembered he wore a mask and felt like an idiot, he wiped his mask to get rid of the red liquid and picked up the head to put it with the rest. He tied the knot and rested the sack on his shoulders.

"Sakuya, I finished collecting the heads, wanna go back to the guild and get our rewards for this quest?" The younger sibling nodded her head and waited for her brother to pickup the pace to begin their long journey back to the guild house. Zuskato and Sakuya decided to that on one of the towns to the way of the Guru State, they would stop and take a rest in the taverns.

Making sure that they wouldn't get bored, Zuskato started to have a small chat with his sister to distract themselves from the silence of their trip, "I don't know about you, but I could go for some food right now." Zuskato said, causing Sakuya to nodded at his statement saying she was on the same boat as him.

"Yeah, I wonder if they'll let me in the kitchen." Sakuya wondered, while cupping her chin in a thinking manner. The older sibling sweatdropped at the pinkette's antics and just continued to walk along the road, however, his instincts screamed at him to move and so he did.

Throwing the sack to the side and pulling his sister to back up away, the ground that they previously occupied suddenly shattered and erupted with a giant worm-like monster appearing out of the crater, dirt and stone flew everywhere, Zuskato had to safely avoid them with his sister in his arms, large chunks of debris were just a step away from landing on the two, but the agility the red adventurer made it easy for him to dodge while carrying his sister.

After the debris was done falling, Zuskato stopped backpedaling and let go of Sakuya who was still shocked to her core. The area around them were littered with wreckage. After a second the worm screeched making Sakuya cover her ears to prevent them from getting damaged, Zuskato however instinctively stood in front of his sister and readied his spear at the worm.

It stopped it's horrifying screams and faced the two humans below it, it's size easily towered over the smaller beings and it's shadow loomed over them, it opened it mouth and showcased multiple rows of teeth, all were sharp and of different sizes. The Cell Worm continued to stare down it's pray waiting for them to move.

There was an intense silent in the air, the only thing you'll hear is the raspy breathing of the Cell Worm. Zuskato still kept his spear's blade aimed at the large monster in front of him and Sakuya who struggled to keep herself from fainting from the amount of killer instinct in the air. Zuskato felt her distress and decided to calm her down by holding her hand, the younger sibling snapped out of her dazed state and stared at Zuskato's back.

"Calm down, Sakuya, nothing bad's gonna happen to us." He reassured, Sakuya slowly nodded at her brother's words while quickly breathing in and out to calm herself down, "On my signal, cast Vanguard." He softly ordered letting go of Sakuya's hand and gripping on his spear firmly, the pinkette got the message and quietly prepared the spell.

'I promise, nothing bad is going to happen, especially you.' Zuskato mentally added, the Cell Worm breathed in and out slowly. Waiting for any sudden movements for it to take advantage of it's 'eyes' scanned the two and it felt the fear of both of them yet the red haired one's fear was not of fear for himself but for his companion's.

...And that was when the Cell Worm thought now would be a good time to pounce.

"Now!"

"Okay! By the Warriors of Defense: Vanguard!" Sakuya outstretched her staff while it glow a blue light hue, a magical giant shield manifested infront of the two making the Cell Worm do a head on collision with the shield causing said monster to screech in pain, Zuskato lunged at the monster and proceed to slice it's exposed body with a multitude of slashes, Zuskato looked as if he was dancing in the air. The Cell Worm having recovered from the impact with the shield tried to retaliate against Zuskato, however the smallee size gave the adventurer the advantage and dodged just as the Cell Worm came ramming into the ground digging down.

Seeing the strategy the Worm was about to do, Sakuya dropped the Vanguard and casted a lightning spell to the crater the Cell Worm was trying to escape in, "By the Lightning's Might: Lightning Bolt!" A blueish lightning bolt shot out of Sakuya's staff and hit the worm directly forcing it to stop digging and pull back, the electricity paralyzed the monster giving Zuskato the chance to hop on it and stab the blade deep into the skin of the worm, Zuskato used his spear as a platform to swing up land himself on top of it's head. He raised his spear over his head and plunged the blade deeper into the skin before using his strength to rip through the skin even further causing it's blood to violently spill out, the Cell Worm screeched in pain of being both electrocuted and stabbed multiple times.

The worm begun to shake it's whole body violently in an attempt to get Zuskato off its head, the red adventurer tried to cling onto its exposed injury however, it's shaking made it difficult for him to grab on to it, alas, the Cell Worm successfully got Zuskato off and crash down to the ground. He groaned as he landed hard on the glassy plane, the worm saw its opportunity to kill him and lunged at the downed spearman, but just as it could finish the job a streak of flames burned it making the monster pull back to avoid getting burnt any further.

Sakuya quickly casted another spell to follow up as the worm turned it's attention to her, "By the Water's Waves: Ice Spikes!" A dozen Ice spikes materialized on top of the worm and came down plunging themselves into it's skin, the Cell Worm screeched loudly causing Sakuya to cover her ears again, the Cell Worm stopped and lunged at the pinkette, Zuskato intervened diagonally slashing the side of it's head but it didn't stop and instead swung it's head into Zuskato pushing back to the ground hard.

It did the same to Sakuya except she collided with a tree, the air was knocked out of her lungs and caused her to momentarily drop the staff she held. Seeing that there were no longer any interruptions, the Cell Worm sped up and going for a meal that was Sakuya, said girl got over her impact and weakly got up from the ground using what little mana she had left to cast another Vanguard spell.

Zuskato saw that she wasn't going to get the spell ready in time, hastily got up and spun his spear before letting it hit the ground as a blue glyph with the symbol of Water appearing underneath his feet and chanted a spell, "By the Way of The Spear: Heaven's Fall!" The spearman leapt high into the air he raised his spear above his head readying devastating downward spiral water attack. The spear glowed blue as Zuskato flung himself towards the worm.

The Cell Worm decided to stop and look up just as Zuskato came back down to the ground easily slicing through the skin of the monster and cutting it's "head" separating it from the body, the ground exploded in a large dust and dirt smoke cloud before being a gust of wind violently pushed all of it everywhere, Sakuya, who cast the Vanguard just as Zuskato hit the ground, was protected by the shield and braced herself as not to get pushed back by the wind that generated cause of the impact.

Seconds passed and the wind finally stopped it's rampage getting a clear view of the aftermath, Zuskato's spear was stabbed on the ground with it's user trying to catch his breath, his breathing was rigid, and he looked as if he would passout at any given moment. Seeing that to be a possiblity, Sakuya quickly ran up to her brother's aid dispelling the now not needed Vanguard. When she got within close proximity, Sakuya dropped her staff and grabbed Zuskato's arm over her shoulders while she wrapped her arms around his torso.

"What did I say about being reckless!" She cried out, clearly caring for his well being, Zuskato dryly chuckled and moved his hand to remove the mask covering his face and dropping it to the ground. The older sibling faced his younger one and smiled trying and failing to reassure her, Sakuya eyes watered as she thought of the worse that could happen but the face Zuskato made stopped all manner of thoughts and focused on the one starting at her.

"Sorry about breaking my promise, but it was the only thing I could think of to kill the thing..." He stated, weakly letting go of his spear and slump down onto the ground, he added. "Plus, I'd rather die then see you get hurt."

Sakuya opened her mouth to argue, but the sounds of horses and footsteps running towards them shut her up, she looked at the distance and saw adventurers accompained with town guards closing in on their position, Zuskato slightly turned his head to the left and saw them, he smiled before deciding to pass out due to the fatigue and mana drain he experienced.

And so, our story begins...


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zuskato woke up from his mana exhaustion only to find himself in a tavern room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright, this was supposed to be published earlier during January, but I had to delay it due to some unforeseen circumstances, hopefully the third chapter won't take me this long.
> 
> Also! A bit of warning in this chapter, it has mention of attempted rape! So if you can't stomach that you can just skip the whole sequence entirely.

_Unknown Location._

My eyesight was bleak, my conscious slowly drafting away, the ground was hard and cold. The only sounds I could hear was my own breathing and the occasional water drops. I tried to lift my head, but the pain I felt doing so prevented me, I could just look at the rocky ground I was laying on.

 **"ĐØ ɎØɄ ₣ɆɆⱠ ł₮? ₮ⱧɆ ⱧØ₱ɆⱠɆ₴₴₦Ɇ₴₴ ɎØɄ ₳₦Đ ɎØɄⱤ ₵Ø₥Ɽ₳ĐɆ₴ ₳ⱤɆ ₣ɆɆⱠł₦₲?"**  A disembodied voice mocked me, I gritted my teeth in frustration, I need to get up, I HAVE to get up. I can't just lay here while the others were getting beaten and worse, killed.

 **"ĐØ ɎØɄ ₮Ⱨł₦₭ ɎØɄ Ⱨ₳VɆ ₴Ʉ₵Ⱨ ₱Ø₩ɆⱤ ₮Ø ĐØ ₴Ø?"**  The voice questioned, I grunted angrily, and powered through the pain my body had even barely getting up from my downed position. My breathing was rigid, my body stiff from all the pain that it experienced, my mind doing everything it can to stop me from succumbing to the pain.  **"ⱧØ₩ ₵₳₦ ɎØɄ ₱ⱤØ₮Ɇ₵₮ ₮ⱧɆ₥ ł₣ ɎØɄ ₵₳₦'₮ ɆVɆ₦ ₱ⱤØ₮Ɇ₵₮ ɎØɄⱤ₴ɆⱠ₣!."**

 **"₱₳₮ⱧɆ₮ł₵."**  It mocked again, this time I had enough of the voice and I barked back "Shut up!"

***BREAK***

_Tavern_

Zuskato's eyes shot up as he woke up from the mysterious dream he experienced. In reaction to being awoken, the red adventurer rubbed his eyes to rid it off the sleepiness.

 _'Ahhh... My head feels like hell and so does my body.'_  Zuskato commented mentally from his tired state, the adventurer slowly lifted his body off the bed and looked around the room he's in. The room was normal, it looked like a typical tavern room, two beds a table a bookshelf and window in the middle of the room. Zuskato slowly turned his attention to the wooden table and saw some books laying on top of it.

Curiously, Zuskato slid his legs out of the blanket that covered him and got out of the bed, his feet hitting the wooden floor. He stretched to rid himself off of the stiffness in his body, sighing in bliss as he heard the bones crack, he first looked at himself and saw he was wearing a dark greenish sleeveless shirt which showed his firm and muscular arms, which showed that he had some kind of birthmark on his right arm, he wore brown baggy pants for legwear.

Zuskato frowned, "Where the hell are my clothes and armour?" He said out loud and to absolutely no one, after a few silent seconds, he shrugged his shoulders and slowly walked up to the table, he glanced the wooden furniture tracing his fingers feeling the smoothness of it's surface, Zuskato lightly smiled and grabbed one of the books flipping it over.

The book written as: "The Brief History of Shattered." Zuskato hummed softly and opened the book, being greeted with a first page titled: "Chapter 1: The Shattering." Raising an eyebrow, Zuskato curiously read the contents of the page.

_'The Shattered War, many have their own theories on how it first started, however the most common and possible one, is the awakening of the Archon, the landscape of the world was once connected, but due to the exposure of extremely potent magical power. The world shook down to it's core causing massive earthquakes and volcanic eruptions thus the lands were shaped to what they are now.'_

_'The Burmo State and Republic of Hama in the Southwest, the Empire of Kima on the Northwest, Mamono Kingdom up North, the Asrto Isles in the East and Odel's Union at Southeast. These were the kingdoms that occupied Shattered's lands, the Burmo State being the biggest and the Republic Of Hama being the smallest.'_

' _However, The Asrto Isles are a wildcard in this case, there are two local kingdoms within the land, the Kingdom of Guru and the Kingdom of Navla, two of these kingdoms serve as the local powers within Asrto Isles, however, they choose not to sign in as their respective names and settled for the name, Asrto Isles after the founder, Asrto last name unknown.'_

_'Wars have been declared, such as the Hamitan-Kimahan War, the Burmo Civil War and Odel's Rebellion, the Hamitan-Yamiese War was the most brutal war in post-Shattered History, stacking up a staggering two million lives lost in war and an unknown amount of civilian deaths. The only Kingdoms that haven't experienced war is the Mamono Kingdom and the Asrto Isles.'_

_'It's a good thing we're in the Asrto Isles then.'_  Zuskato quipped as he stopped reading the book and placed it down on the table, he sighed, no one knows what caused the Hamitan-Kimahan War, some say it was due to a fight over power and political influence, some said it was due to a Kimahan murdering a Hamitan in cold blood. No one could agree which one was the true cause of the war, so it was left to mostly speculation.

Zuskato shook his head, this isn't what he was supposed to be thinking now, what he needs to think about where Sakuya is, and if he remembers it right, the last thing he saw was men and horses before blacking out due to the mana exhaustion he experienced.

That and he needed to find where the hell his mask and clothes are. Shifting his gaze, he saw another book on the table that caught his eye. Thinking about how bored he is at the moment, he slowly grabbed the book and read it's title.

The book's title was: "Adventurer's Guide." Zuskato raised an eyebrow, why would a book about adventuring be in a tavern room? The spearman shrugged it off, probably none of his business, pushing back the chair a bit to make room for him, Zuskato sat down on it and opened the book.

 _'Maybe I'll read this book for now while Sakuya isn't here yet.'_  He thought as he aimlessly flipped the pages finding a chapter he finds interesting, after a while, he saw the many different rankings for adventurer's and decided to reread the whole guide despite knowing it already.

' _As you register to a guild, you will receive a bronze tag, these are the beginner's tag and signifies your status as an adventurer.'_  Zuskato paused and flipped the page to continue reading. _'There are ten rankings, they are: Bronze, Iron, Lapis, Steel, Emerald, Ruby, Silver, Gold, Diamond and Titanium, Bronze being the lowest and Titanium being the highest. Silver and rarely, Gold tagged adventurers are the highest fielded adventurers you'll see, Diamond adventurers are usually incredibly rare to come across, only a few hundred have ever achieve the rank.'_

 _'The most notably Diamond Rank Adventurers are: Zanha Barward, The Seeker of Blades. Genru Hiyu, General Of Hundreds. And Kuto Lacson, Mistress of Knives.'_  Zuskato continued, _'Titanium Ranked Adventurers on the other hand, are legendary, at most only ten have ever been promoted to this rank, their names are known across Shattered, books, songs and festivals were made to honour their achievements. Many have tried to achieve this rank, but many have failed, only those who's actions are justified, pure and impactful can be promoted to this rank.'_

Zuskato huffed, he then flipped the page, yet the thing that was printed on it was something about money saving, he already knew how to do that and thus closed the book and layed it on the table. He sighed and slumped back on his chair, he hummed a tone to distract himself from the boredom.

"Damn, now would be a good time for Sakuya to open the door and greet me." Zuskato commented, he turned his head to the door waiting for someone to open it, knowing that to not be the case, he sighed and tiredly got up from the chair he was seating in and walked back to the bed he slept on, literally just dropping face first into the surprisingly comfy bed.

Zuskato positioning himself to be as comfy as possible on the bed, he quietly recalled a distant memory.

The time he saved that caravan from getting robbed by bandits back then.

***Flashback***

"Listen, give us all the gold you got and nobody gets hurt!" A bald muscular man demanded as he held his blade at the people he was trying to rob, he and his buddies were just hit the jackpot seeing as the caravan they were gonna steal from looked like it was full of gold and food.

The man grinned as he shifted his gaze at the fine girls the caravan had, he would surely have a good time with these women, he turned his attention to a girl, her orange eyes, black-brownish hair, she looked ripe for the picking.

"So are you gonna give us the gold? Or are we gonna do this the hard way?" And to emphasize the statement, one of the bandits grabbed a girl, she thrashed around trying to loosen the man's grip but she couldn't.

The bandits laughed at her pitiful attempts, the one that held her pushed her to the ground and started to rip her clothes off, tears in her eyes as she struggled to stop him but his strength easily overpowered hers, the onlookers especially the other girls cringed as they were forced to watch their friend get harassed by a bandit.

"Guess we'll do this the hard way, huh?" The bandit laughed as he ripped all of her clothes leaving her naked as the day she was born. He held her hands over her head, she tried to struggle but it didn't nothing other than exciting the bandits further.

Dread washed over the girl as he traced his hand down south, it was slowly making it's way to her sarced spot, she whimpered and closed her eyes trying to drown out the laughter. The bandit grinned as he took in her fearful face.

The bandits were so distracted that they didn't hear footsteps coming their way along with the sounds of an object getting thrown through the air and it was heading to them fast.

A brown speedy blur went passed them and collided with the bandit that tried to rape the girl, the last thing he felt was a sharp point entering his head, too shocked to process what happened, one of the bandits was kicked far from his group, rolling on the ground till he stopped and groaned in pain.

Zuskato hastily run up to the dead bandit's body and kicked him off of the girl, he pulled out his spear and was about to slash the bandit he kicked away earlier, but his instincts kicked in and told him to block, thankfully he listened to it, using the spear's handle, he blocked a blade from hitting him.

Zuskato turned his head and saw that one of the bandits had recovered from his shock and planned to slice him, unfortunately for the bandit, it didn't. Zuskato steadily kept the blade in place and was overpowering the bandit who tried to slash him.

Winning in the power struggle, Zuskato turned his spear around to lock the bandit's arm, now that the it was locked, Zuskato snapped the it by pulling downwards, breaking the elbow joint and causing the bandit to scream in pain, freeing up the broken arm, Zuskato quickly span around and sliced the bandit's head clean off.

Zuskato twirled his spear around and used the blunt of his spear to thrust it into the gut of the bandit behind him who just recovered from getting kicked hard, the red adventurer struck upwards causing the bandit to lose balance as he fell to the ground, Zuskato seeing the opportunity, spun his spear then plunged the sharp blade into the bandit's head, killing him.

Seeing a shadow looming over him, Zuskato sidestepped to the left avoiding an axe that would've chopped him in half. Turning his body to face his adversary, Zuskato saw a bald muscular man who's taller than Zuskato himself and had a scar on his cheek, he ripped his axe off the ground and rested it on his shoulder, a frown was clearly displayed on his face.

'Must be the boss, but it's just me and him now.' Zuskato commented as his eyes roamed around to look for anymore bandits alive. Seeing that there weren't any, he gripped his spear firmly and focused his attention on the big man in front of him.

The Bandit Boss lunged at him raising his axe to slice down Zuskato, surprised by the speed he demonstrated, Zuskato quickly backed away to dodge the axe, catching up with him, the man tried to horizontally slash the adventurer, said adventurer saw the attack and ducked underneath it while thrusting his spear forward, yet it collided with the flat surface of the Bandit Boss' axe blade, sparks flew while Zuskato retracted his spear then twisting his body to add more power to the slash and using it to push himself back.

The Bandit Boss brought up his axe, blocking the attack and retaliated, Zuskato span himself to parry the attack and dodge the other. Landing on the ground, Zuskato quickly sidestepped to the right as the Bandit Boss tried to grab him, seizing the opportunity, Zuskato readied a sidekick and aimed straight for the head, however, the Bandit Boss moved his body, allowing his shoulder to take the blow nullifying the impact, smirking, the Bandit Boss grabbed Zuskato's ankle and pulled him over while punching him down to the ground.

The red adventurer hissed as he felt the impact from both getting punched hard and hitting the ground just as hard, feeling his breath get forcibly taken out of him, he recovered in time though, rolling to the sides to avoid having his head smashed to bits by the Bandit Boss' boots.

Rolling away on the ground to get a bit of a distance advantage at least, Zuskato got up and steadily aimed his spear at the bandit, the man smirked as he saw the masked bastard prepare himself. "You really are somethin' y'know?" The bandit commented on his opponent, this guy had the nerve to come out of nowhere killing his crew and then preventing him from having a good time!

"I'm gonna make you sorry for what you did to my crew! And for making mad!" He roared while charging at his smaller adversary, his first diagonal swing threated to cleave Zuskato apart, but he moved out of harm's way, even the next vertical swing was not fast enough as the red adventurer dodged with ease. The next series of swings were easily avoided gracefully by Zuskato who looked as if he was dancing.

He stopped dodged to bend his lower body to duck underneath a swing that missed him entirely, the red adventurer countered with a swing of his own forcing the bandit to cease his attacks and block the incoming swing, the impact was stronger than he anticipated as it flung his arm backwards, Zuskato was able to force the Bandit Boss to back away with a swing.

The red adventurer retracted his spear and assumed a stance once more, the Bandit Boss stopped backpedaling and roared, charging straight for his opponent, he raised his axe over his head and swung a downward vertical strike, which was avoid easily by the more nimble fighter of the two, the Bandit Boss tried to follow it up with a horizontal slash, however, Zuskato only resorted to jumping up in the air to dodge it, while midair, he spun himself to perform a spinning kick, staggering the Bandit and forcing him to stumble in his footing.

Landing on the ground, Zuskato immediately put up his spear over his head to block the axe that would've sliced him apart, the red adventurer kicked his opponent's knee causing him to bend down and release his dreadlock over the spear. Zuskato followed up with a high kick to the chin and a spinning kick to the gut, pushing the Bandit Boss away as he recovered from the three kick combo.

Out of frustration, the Bandit Boss did a strong but predicable horizontal swing giving Zuskato the chance to retaliate with a forward thrust, thankfully, the Bandit Boss parried the attack in time, a smirk found its way on Zuskato's face as he continued the same forward thrust multiple times causing the Bandit Boss to block each one, but one after the other he struggled to keep up, with the last forward thrust, it's impact caused the Bandit Boss' arm holding his axe to outstretch leaving him vulnerable.

A swift kick to the gut caused him backpaddle once more, Zuskato didn't stop there as he came up behind him and horizontally swung his spear gushing the back of his opponent's body then roundhouse kicked his head to throw him off balance, almost falling down to the ground, the Bandit Boss recovered fast enough to block stab to the head.

Using his superior physical strength, the Bandit Boss pushed Zuskato back causing him to be valuable to a counterattack, smirking at the chance, the man moved his arm to diagonally slash the adventurer infront of him. However, Zuskato being faster, was able to lean to the left narrowly avoiding the axe as it passed him.

Everything slowed down as Zuskato saw a dagger sheathed on his opponent's hips, taking the dagger, he plunged it deep into the man's ripcage, the red adventurer then span his spear and slashed diagonally upwards as time resume normally. The air thickened and silence washed over the area as all physical movement came to a halt, and the bystanders held their breath as they watch the two fighters.

Blood dripped down from the Bandit Boss' ripcage as he looked at it, seeing his own dagger deep inside his flesh, his breath was rigid, he felt numb but soon after, his right arm slowly came off, finally registering the pain, he screamed loudly and fell to the ground screeching in pain. "Gugggghhhhhaaaaahhhh!" He screamed painfully, Zuskato on the other hand stood up straight as he span his spear to rid it off of blood, when it did, he turned around to gaze the downed Bandit he, um, disarmed, the red adventurer slowly walked up to the bandit as he was still trying to ease the unbearable pain he's feeling.

Kicking him over, the bandit layed on his back as a boot kept him from getting up, he was face to face with the masked guy that killed his whole crew, he thrashed but he was too weak to do so, he looked around to see if there was anything that could get him out of this miss and found none.

Having no other option than to bid his time, the Bandit Boss tried to bluff his out of it, "Look! I have a wife and kids, I promise I won't do this anymore! I'll- I'll go straight just please let me go!" He cried out as tears fell from his eyes, hoping that the guy holding him down would buy it, Zuskato hummed as he thought of what he would do, but seeing as he had the advantage in this situation.

"Sure I'll let you go." The Bandit Boss was surprised, 'Did this idiot really bought into his story?! Whatever! I'm free now-'

"After I kill you." Before he could even say anything, Zuskato took his foot off the man's chest and stabbed his spear into the Bandit Boss' head, killing him instantly, Zuskato smirked underneath his mask and pulled his spear out of the bandit's head, he dusted off the blood that spilled out and turned his attention to the girls that were next to the caravan.

His eyes landed on the girl that was naked and came up to her, he reached back into his backpockets and pulled out a white cloak anf wrapped the cloak around the girl to cover her, after seeing what he did, she quietly thanked him, Zuskato smiled as he placed a hand on his mask and took it off strapping it on the right side of his hips and showed her his warm smile.

She had purple hair which gradually turned black at the ends, her pale blue eyes were watery from all the tears that fell from them, she looked young, maybe a bit older than Zuskato himself, but still young and beautiful.

She was awestruck as the one who saved her and her friends was nothing more than a teenager about their age, his enchanting eyes gave her the scene of security and warmth, Zuskato wrapped his arms around the girl and helped her up, the red adventuree than guided her to the back of the caravan and helped her go in, one of the girls walked with them and got inside to talk with her friend.

Zuskato turned around and was met with the face of a beautiful brownish black haired girl with orange colored eyes, she was of average height and weight, her hair was just able to reach half her back, she wore a caravan's garb like all her friends. A brown undershirt with a darker shade of brown overalls, a light brown skirt with black-brownish boots.

"Thank you! Thank you so much for saving us!" The orange eyed girl praised as she bowed to show her appreciation, Zuskato cupped her chin and lifted her up to show her he was smiling warmly.

"It's nothing, I heard a scream when I was just strolling around the nearby forest and so I came as fast as I could." His expression then turned grim, "But apparently not enough." He finished as he turned his head to the girl wearing the cloak he gave her. Seeing the grim expression on his face, the orange haired girl decided to change the subject.

"What's your name and rank if you do mind?" She asked, Zuskato snapped out of it and showed her the his steel colored adventure tag.

"Name's Zuskato Zyus, a Steel Ranked Adventurer, nice to meet you miss?" Zuskato said as he asked for the name of the female Infront of him.

"Candi Oiggson, the girl you saved is my friend, Sarcot Osen and her sister, Kin Osen." Candi gestured to herself and to her friends as she finished her sentence. Zuskato hummed softly, taking in the information.

"Well, how about I guide you ladies to the nearest town? Can't be too safe, especially after what happened." The statement he made, made all of the females nod their heads in agreement. So, they set out to the nearest town they could found.

"By the way." Candi asked out of the blue while walking.

"Hm?"

"How was your spear able to block an axe? Wouldn't it be able to slice through it like butter?"

Zuskato smirked, he stopped walking which prompted the whole caravan to stop themselves.

"It's enchanted." To emphasize on his words, Zuskato lightly shook his weapon and caused it to glow a blue hue, "That's why."

He kept on walking like nothing even happened.

*Flashback End*

Zuskato was forced to snap out of his musing by the sounds of a door opening. He stood up from his laying position, the door opened revealing Sakuya who was holding what seems to be clothes and... Is that his mask? She was humming a tone as she walked to the table and dropped the clothing on it, not even noticing that her brother was awake.

She refolded the clothing and placed the armour in chronological order in parallel to the clothes and finally placed the mask on top of the said clothing, she dusted her hands as if she was doing a hard job and smiled to herself, satisfied with her work, Sakuya would've left the room if she didn't open her eyes and saw that Zuskato was already up and watching her the entire time.

An awkward silence took over the room as Sakuya stared into her brother's eyes while he gazed back.

"So, um, good morning...?" Deciding to break the ice first, Zuskato asked shyly which snapped Sakuya out of her freeze up, she coughed into her hand and recomposed herself.

"Right, good morning Onii-chan." She walked up to Zuskato and literally slapped him in the face, hard.

Zuskato cupped the red hand mark on his face and winced a little due to the sting, he rubbed his cheek softly to ease the pain and turned his head to his sister, "I deserve that." He confessed, not even mad for getting slapped in the face, he just accepted it and moved on, Sakuya hugged her brother tightly, doing what a brother would do, Zuskato hugged his sister back stroking her hair.

After a full minute of embracing each other, Sakuya let go of her brother while rubbing her eyes and faced him, Zuskato stared at his sister with a neutral look, giving her the his full attention.

"You broke your promise." She informed him, "Why did you have to be reckless?"

"I know and I'm sorry, it was the only thing I could think of that would work at the time." Zuskato answered with a sad look in his eyes, he avoided eye contact with his sister as he said his sentence. Sakuya frowned, she knew that it was true, but the mana exhaustion he experienced could've had dire consequences, luckily, he didn't get the latter, but better to be safe than sorry, "Plus, you were in danger, i couldn't just sit and do nothing."

Sakuya pouted sadly, she couldn't fault her brother for thinking that way, but he should at least take it easy, shaking her head out of the thoughts, Sakuya got off the bed and gestured Zuskato to do it as well, he did and was now standing with his sister.

"Well enough about that, how about you change into your clothes and armour first?" She pointed her thump behind her pointing at said clothing laying on the table along with his armour and mask, Zuskato grinned and nodded, making his way passed her and to the table getting ready to change into his clothes.

"Speaking of clothing, how come you didn't bring my spear?" Zuskato asked as he took off the sleeveless shirt and grabbed his white polo shirt buttoning it after putting it on.

"Well, when the townsfolk saw us, they tried to retrieve your spear." She answered while taking a seat on the bed again, "And due to the mana overload, it broke your spear on first contact, basically breaking it into a thousand tiny pieces."

Zuskato frowned upon hearing his spear breaking, he took off the pants and threw it to the other bed, he grabbed his pants and slowly slid his legs into the pants putting them on.

Zuskato then grabbed a belt and ran it around his waste to keep the pants in place, he straightened out just in case and finally fashioned it, he gave a few slaps checking if it was firmly buckled in.

"I guess I'll have to buy another one." He added while putting on his red jacket after straightening it out, he then grabbed a leather armband and strapped them on, "Shame really, I loved that spear, been using it since we first started."

"I don't think you'll have to worry about that." Sakuya proclaimed.

"Really?" He questioned, taking a piece of his armour and strapping it to his arms then doing the rest as well.

"Yeah, the town's blacksmith took the liberty to reforge your spear with the Cell Worm's teeth and other metal materials."

"Is that so?" He hummed, while refitting the red tie on his neck, leaving the aforementioned red jacket unbuttoned which showed the white polo shirt exposed for all to see.

"Yup!" She said, popping the 'p' in her answer.

"I'm not even gonna ask about the cost if that's the case." He stated, strapping the last armour piece onto his arms, he took his mask and strapped it to the side of his hips. He turned to his sister giving her a full view of her brother's attire.

"Well, how do I look?"

"Like you always do, Zu-Zu." Sakuya giggled while Zuskato smiled at his affectionate nickname. The pinkette lifted herself out of the bed and walked to the door, Zuskato followed her lead standing right behind her.

"Also, where's your sword and staff?" Sakuya smiled while turning her head to face Zuskato.

"It's getting reforged as well! And for your information, the reforging is free!" She said bubbly and opened the door not even waiting for her brother to move as she walked out the room closing the door behind her.

Zuskato stood there, stunned at his sister's actions, but then grinned and shook his head happily.

He cupped the door's handle turning it to open the door and walked out of the room to follow Sakuya.


End file.
